VISTAS Counselor Education and Supervision

VISTAS Online is an innovative publication produced for ACA by Dr. Garry R. Walz and Dr. Jeanne C. Bleuer of Counseling Outfitters, LLC. Its purpose is to provide a means of capturing the ideas, information and experiences generated by the annual ACA Conference and selected ACA Division Conferences. Papers on a program or practice that has been validated through research or experience may also be submitted. This digital collection of peer-reviewed articles is authored by counselors, for counselors. VISTAS Online contains the full text of over 900 proprietary counseling articles published from 2004 to 2017.

Adolescent residential treatment centers (RTCs) serve high-risk, high-need adolescent populations. A sound clinical supervision approach helps improve counseling skills and can increase the overall effectiveness of clinical assistance to youth. This study evaluated the use of a unique clinical supervision approach in an adolescent RTC setting. The approach was constructed based on Walborn’s process variables, Ivey’s skills and stages of the counseling process, and Bernard’s Discrimination Model. These concepts were used as the tools for supervision planning and outcome evaluation. The participants were 16 clinicians working in a residential treatment site for adolescents. The participants were

assessed over at least a 1-year period and were supervised by one of two clinical supervisors at least bi-weekly. The results of the outcome study indicated that there were significant outcome improvements in six of seven areas among clinical staff.
​